Turkey
Turkey has long been one of the best places in the world to hire remote talent. But if you’re not acquainted with Turkey’s local labor laws, it can get confusing, fast. Good news: We are acquainted with those labor laws. On this page, we’ll teach you how to hire in Turkey—without spending thousands of dollars on EOR fees and legal red tape:
Country snapshot
CURRENCY
Turkish Lira (TRY)
EMPLOYER TAXES
22.5%
PAYROLL FREQUENCY
Monthly
OFFICIAL LANGUAGE
Turkish
It’s the fastest way to hire globally
Hiring employees takes months, at the minimum. When you hire with Thera's locally-generated contracts, it’s a matter of days or weeks. This means you can hire the best talent, fast, without losing them to a hellish procession of paperwork.
It’s a lot cheaper
It costs just $0 to sign up for Thera, then $25 per month to hire your contractors with Thera. If you hired employees manually (or did contracting on your own), you’d likely be on the hook for thousands of dollars each month. Setting up an entity alone can cost tens of thousands of dollars.
It’s more flexible for you & your team
Can be less risky than hiring employees
Hiring employees is a bigger commitment, and can open you up to increased liabilities and regulations. When you hire contractors overseas, your biggest risk is misclassification—but laws surrounding contractor classification are often significantly more straightforward.
Some people want to be employees
The contractor life isn’t for everyone—some people want the security that being an employee often appears to provide. Though it’s rare, this does happen, and it’s one disadvantage of manage an all-contractor team.
You might not have as much control over your talent
Most countries’ contractor-employer relationship laws stipulate that the employer can’t set fixed working hours, among other things. These laws give contractors more freedom over how and when they do their work than an employee would have. In reality, however, most contractors are willing & able to work on the company’s schedule—it’s a matter of setting expectations beforehand.
Laws about hiring are complicated, and the same is true in Turkey. But there are ways to sidestep the headaches—if your company hasn’t already established a physical presence in Turkey, you have two real options when it comes to hiring. We’ll detail both below.
Hire talent as contractors
Hire talent as employees
If you’ve read up until this point, you’ll know that it’s easier, cheaper, and more flexible to hire contractors in Turkey than employees. Still, there are valid reasons why you might want to hire employees instead. The content below is for you—we’ll cover employer taxes and obligations in Turkey.
Employer tax
Short Term Insurance Branch Premium
Pension & Disability
General Health Insurance
Unemployment Insurance
Individual tax
- 0-24,000 - 15%
- 650,001+ - 40%
Paid Time Off (PTO)
Paid time off increases with seniority:
14 days for those with 1-5 years’ service.
20 days for those with 6-14 years’ service.
26 days for those with 15+ years’ service.
Employees over 50 automatically get 20 days. Those who work underground get an additional 4 days to their level of service.
The employer must pay the annual leave entitlement as a lump sum or as an advance payment before the beginning of the leave.
Public Holidays
There are 14 public holidays per year.
Sick Days
There is no mandatory obligation for the employer to pay the employee salary during sick leave. After 3 days of sick leave, the Social Security will pay the employee. In practice, many employers pay regular salary for the first 2 days (which are not covered by the SS) or even for the entire period of sick leave (and get partial refund when paid by SS). After 6 weeks of sick leave, the employer is entitled to terminate the employee’s employment.
Maternity Leave
Working mothers are entitled to up to 16 weeks of maternity leave at full pay. Up to 8 weeks out of this leave may be used prior to their child’s birth. At least 3 weeks must be taken before the due date. In the case of premature or multiple births, the total maternity leave will be 18 weeks. Payment during maternity leave comes from social security according to the regular contributions of the employee.
Paternity Leave
The father is entitled to 5 days of paternity leave.
During paternity leave the employee receives regular salary, paid by the employer.
Parental Leave
If both parents are employed, they are entitled to work part-time until the child starts primary school. The employee is required to provide an employer with written notice of the request at least a month in advance.
Parents are also entitled to up to 10 days of leave to attend treatment/medical appointments for a child with a disability or chronic disease.
Other Leave
Military leave: Employees are entitled to up to 90 days of paid leave per year when called up for military exercises or the performance of a statutory obligation, other than compulsory military service.
Marriage Leave
3 days, subject to presenting an official approval of marriage date.
Bereavement Leave
3 days, with respect to losing a close relative such as parent or child.
Termination Process
There is an obligation to provide a reason for terminating an employee’s employment.
The reason must relate to the capacity or conduct of the employee or based on the operational requirements of the undertaking.
There are exclusions to such obligations, including:
Fix term contract; employees who worked less than 6 months; an employer who employs less than 30 employees; employer’s representatives and his assistants authorized to manage the entire enterprise. In such cases no need to provide a just reason for dismissal, but the employer is still obligated to avoid abusive or discriminating dismissal.
Notice Period
Notice is determined by seniority:
0 – 6 months 2 weeks
6 – 18 months 4 weeks
18 – 36 months 6 weeks
More than 36 months 8 weeks
Severance Pay
Generally, employees who worked more than 1 year and were unfairly dismissed (or resigned due to just cause) are entitled to severance pay. The maximum amount of such payment varies according to the specific salary and up to the amount of 6,730.15 TRL per annum (for 2020), multiplied by the number of years that the employee worked for the employer.
Probation Period
The probation period is limited to 2 months.
Working Hours
A workweek is 45 hours. Hours can be distributed unevenly over the work days provided no single day lasts longer than 11 hours.
Overtime
Hours worked over 45 in a week are overtime and paid 150% of a regular salary. Hours worked during the weekend are paid at 200%.
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